


Eleven Lessons of War

by amosanguis



Series: author's fave [60]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, And Soviet Brainwashing, Angst, BAMF Steve Rogers, Canon-Typical Violence, Gay Love Can Pierce Through The Veil of Death, M/M, Non-Linear Narrative, OTP: No Not Without You, Post-Serum Steve Rogers, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Suicidal Steve Rogers, Suicidal Thoughts, Vengeful Steve Rogers, short scenes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-07
Updated: 2015-05-07
Packaged: 2018-03-29 10:06:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,082
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3892336
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amosanguis/pseuds/amosanguis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve’s been at war his entire life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Eleven Lessons of War

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from Robert McNamara’s “Eleven Lessons of War”

-z-

 

Steve’s been at war his entire life.  At war against the prejudices of his time, against bullies, against Death, against his very own body.

Steve’s been at war his entire life and he’s learned many lessons.

 

-x-

 

**_Lesson 1: Empathize with your enemy._ **

**_(Steve vs. his body.)_ **

 

Steve rails against arms holding him down, screams and fights – feeling the brittleness in his own bones, his body so desperate to stop fighting.

But he doesn’t stop.

He can’t.

(If he stops, if he quits and starts running – they’ll just chase him down, they’ll tear into him harder and deeper, savage him unto the point where he won’t be recovering.)

 He’s picked up and thrown into the brick wall of the alley just behind the theater (he hears something inside his body snap and crack), the breath is knocked from his lungs.

He tries to push himself up, but his arms are shaking too badly.  He gasps, tries to suck oxygen into his lungs – but his throat is too tight, too small, and he can’t breathe.

 _I’ll quit_ , he thinks to himself, _just for tonight, just until I can breathe again._

So he curls into himself, wraps his arms around his head and pretends that everything will be better soon – that one day, he’ll hit his ever elusive growth spurt and his body will stop betraying him and he can finally _fight_.

 

-x-

 

**_Lesson 2: Rationality will not save us._ **

**_(Steve vs. HYDRA, Before)_ **

 

As soon as he gets Bucky back, Steve knows that something has changed.  There’s a change in the way Bucky moves and breathes.

Steve tells himself that the change is from the torture, it’s from the months since Steve’s last seen him.  But he knows it’s so much more than that.

Bucky’s skin and mouth taste different – more chemical and less and less like the coffee and stale cakes from the Russian bakery just down the street that Bucky used to steal from (later, so much later, the irony of that won’t be lost on Steve).

Bucky’s bruises heal faster and Steve pretends he doesn’t know what that means. 

(He does.  He does know and it fills him with the fury he needs to kill any HYDRA goon unlucky enough to cross his path.)

When Colonel Phillips had first told him that it was just as likely that Bucky was dead and gone, Steve had fought the urge to laugh.  He fought the urge to snarl out: _Not if I have anything to say about it_.  Instead, he studies the map on the far wall – memorizes the lines and the borders and, with Peggy and Howard, sets out on his mission.

The papers say that saving the four-hundred-plus POWs makes him a war hero.

Steve doesn’t bother to tell anyone that if Bucky hadn’t been there, if Bucky had still been safe and sound at that camp when Steve and his chorus girls had arrived – that Steve never would have made the trip into the forest.

 

-x-

 

**_Lesson 3: There’s something beyond one’s self._ **

**_(Steve vs. his Howling Commandos, After)_ **

 

There’s a whisper on a scream lost on the howling winds.

Steve stares at nothing.  He loses time.  He thinks he sleeps, he thinks he eats.  He thinks Peggy presses a kiss to his forehead as he tries to drown himself in a bottle of expensive whiskey (maybe it was Peggy, maybe it was Howard – it definitely wasn’t Bucky).

“Don’t leave us just yet,” Dum Dum says, “there’s still a war on, Captain, and the living still need you.”

Steve blinks.  Looks up at the ceiling (he’s in a building but he doesn’t know which one) and then turns back to Dum Dum.

“I’m sorry,” Steve says. 

He’s sorry he couldn’t save Bucky, he’s sorry he withdrew from them, he’s sorry for what he’s about to do. (There are suicide missions and then there are Suicide Missions and Steve knows, for him, their next one will be his last one.)

 

-x-

 

**_Lesson 4: Maximize efficiency._ **

**_(Steve vs. Bucky’s sniper abilities, Before)_ **

 

Steve glares at the range’s paper target at the end of the field as if it had personally offended him.

“I don’t like it,” he says eventually, crossing his arms over his chest.  He knows he’s pouting and he doesn’t care.

“Steve,” Bucky says, rolling his eyes as he stands, brushing dirt from his pants and bringing his sniper rifle up so he could cradle it in his arms, “I’m the best.  Face it.  You need me to be watching your six.”

“And who’ll be watching yours?” Steve counters automatically, turning the force of his glare from the target over to Bucky.

“I’ll be fine, Stevie,” Bucky says (Steve feels the way ice settles over his heart, a warning he hadn’t recognized then).

“Fine,” Steve says, “but I’m not going to like it.”

“You will when I save your ass,” Bucky says, grabs Steve by one of the straps of his Captain America uniform and pulls him in close.

Steve tries to force down his own grin when he says, “Just make sure you’re keeping your scope on the enemy, not my ass.”

“Is that an order, _Captain?_ ” Bucky asks, brushes his lips against Steve’s jaw.

“As if you would follow any order I gave you,” Steve says, bringing a hand to grab Bucky’s chin to still him.  He leans down (which is still an unusual sensation) and presses a soft kiss to Bucky’s lips.  “Just be careful, Buck.”

“I will,” Bucky says, scratching his short nails through the hair at Steve’s nape, “I will be, Steve.”

Steve isn’t sure if he believes him.  (He knows he has to deal with it, though.  Because Bucky’s vision _is_ unparalleled and the Commandoes really do the need the best of the best.)

 

-x-

 

**_Lesson 5: Proportionality_ should _be a guideline in war._**

**_(Steve vs. HYDRA, After)_ **

 

Peggy tries to tell him to take some time, take some time to process what’s happened.

“I don’t need more time,” Steve finally says, staring at the map in the war room as they wait for the others to show up.  _What I need is to kill them all_ , he doesn’t add.

And later, when he tells everyone that they will in fact be tearing down HYDRA’s front door, he knows Phillips wants to say something.  Probably wants to tell him that Steve’s rage won’t serve him well in the long run (he doesn’t know that Steve isn’t planning for a long run, is looking only for a way for this to end fast and hard and bloody).

To save Bucky, Steve had killed hundreds over the years.

For his death, Steve will kill thousands.

(And later, when he sees what Bucky’s become, Steve kills them all.)

 

-x-

 

**_Lesson 6: Get the data._ **

**_(Steve vs. SHIELD, pre-Winter Soldier)_ **

 

Steve had known about Rumlow as soon as he had looked at him.  The way he carried himself around Steve was arrogant and telling – he had a secret and his body telegraphed it.

Steve could have beat it out of him, it would have been easy.  Instead he sits back, waits.  Because whatever it was that Rumlow knew, Steve saw that it was big.

 

-

 

“Come home with me,” Rumlow says, leans in too close – his breath stinks of whiskey and his eyes have a manic light in them.

Maybe any other time Steve would have humored him, would have smirked and drawled out the name.  But it’s the anniversary of Bucky’s Fall and Steve’s mood is dark.

Instead, Steve leans in – keeping only a hair’s-breadth distance between them – “I like men,” Steve says, “not snakes.”

Brock’s breath hitches and his eyes turn cold.  Steve doesn’t care.  He pulls back and steps into the darkness of New York City streets.

 

-

 

They file into the elevator, chattering softly even as they sweat and shake and their hearts race.  Rumlow makes noises of apology but Steve can tell that’s all it is – noise; it’s a distraction.

“Thank you,” Steve says, playing along for whatever it was worth.  He feels the familiar tension beginning to coil in his gut, bunching in his muscles.  He wants to react, but he knows to wait.

And when that first punch is thrown – Steve throws himself into it, doesn’t hide the fact that he’s enjoying himself.  He had known what Rumlow was and lets him see it.

 

-x-

 

**_Lesson 7: Belief and seeing are often both wrong._ **

**_(Steve vs. Winter Soldier)_ **

 

Only one person has ever been able to catch Steve’s shield.  Steve curls his lip and chases after the Soldier, but then the Soldier disappears over the roof and Steve shakes away the images of Bucky falling (because Bucky’s dead and gone, buried under a mountain’s ice and a lover’s regret).

 

-

 

Steve says, “ _Bucky?_ ”

Steve says, “I’m not going to fight you.”

Steve says, “I’m with you until the end of the line.”

 

-

 

The man with Bucky face and Bucky’s voice stands in front of Steve, hair greasy and eyes wet.  And he falls so easily into Steve’s arms, screaming into Steve’s chest.

And it’s not until later, when Bucky’s cleaned up and curled up in Steve’s bed, when he’s said, “I remembered you.  After everything – I remembered you,” that Steve finally believe that it’s _Bucky_.

So Steve says, “Of course you did, Buck,” as he kisses Bucky’s temple.  “Of course you did.”

Because even when there was nothing – no food, no money, no parents or friends or job – when there was _nothing_ , they had each other.

 

-x-

 

**_Lesson 8: Be prepared to re-examine your reasoning._ **

**_(Steve vs. SHIELD, post-Winter Soldier)_ **

 

“I thought you were one of the good guys,” Clint says, staring down the barrel of the gun.

“Go back to your handler,” Steve spits, “tell them I’m killing whoever comes next.”

 

-x-

 

**_Lesson 9: In order to do good, you may have to engage in evil._ **

**_(Steve and Bucky vs. HYDRA)_ **

 

Steve used to take prisoners.

He looks at the chair, at the devices attached, at how Bucky gives them all a wide berth.  

 

-

 

Steve used to take prisoners – he doesn’t anymore.

 

-x-

 

**_Lesson 10: Never say “never.”_ **

**_(Steve vs. Bucky, pre-serum)_ **

 

_1939_

 

“One day,” Bucky says, running his fingers through Steve’s hair as Steve rested his head on Bucky’s chest, “one day I’ll be able to hold your hand as we walk down the street.”

“I doubt it,” Steve says, sitting up suddenly.  He looks over his shoulder to look down at Bucky, “We’re lucky enough to live in this neighborhood – where no one cares if two guys live together in a little apartment with one bed.”

“Plenty of people live a little apartment with one bed,” Bucky says, sitting up to look at Steve better.

“You know what I mean,” Steve says, swinging his legs over the mattress and grunting as he stood – his bruised ribs grinding together painfully.

“One day, Stevie,” Bucky says, voice quiet as he watches Steve walk over to the sink.  “You’ll see.”

Steve turns around slowly, says, “Buck, we all know that, _if_ that day ever comes, I won’t be alive to see it.  That’s too far into the future.”

Bucky doesn’t try to argue, knows that there’s no point to it when Steve gets like this.

 

-

 

_2015_

 

Walking through the mall, Bucky brings Steve’s hand up to his lips and presses a soft kiss there.  Then he says, “What’d I tell ya?”

Steve looks at him, his head cocked to the side.  Bucky swings their joined hands together exaggeratedly.

“Oh my god,” Steve says, remembering their conversation from so long ago.  He shakes his head and laughs as he starts walking forward again.

 

-x-

 

**_Lesson 11: You can’t change human nature._ **

**_(Steve and Bucky vs. the world)_ **

 

Steve pulls Bucky close, buries his nose in Bucky’s hair and breathes in deep – _chemicals, gun powder, blood_ – before pressing a soft, sweet kiss to his forehead.

“I remember when I used to this to you,” Bucky says, his voice a soft whisper.

Steve says, “I remember, too.”

 

-

 

“I have the Winter Soldier,” Steve says, staring straight into the camera.  “I dare any government baying for his blood to try and come and take him from me.”

 

-

 

(They all try.)

(They all fail – paying with their lives.)

 

-x-

 

Steve’s been at war his entire life.  At war against the prejudices of his time, against bullies, against Death, against his very own body.

Steve’s been at war his entire life and he’s learned many lessons.

 

-z-

 

End.


End file.
